Apple announced yesterday that Forstall, the vice president of iOS software, would be leaving the company next year after working there for 15 years. Apple didn't go into much detail other than that, but new reports are shedding light on the situation.

According to Giga OM, Forstall's departure was "fairly last minute" and "not something he initiated." Many iOS and OS X teams as well as engineers were surprised by the news and found out only minutes after it was announced.

However, Forstall didn't seem to make many friends during his time with Apple. Giga OM mentioned that Forstall's exit was "met with a sense of quiet jubilation, especially among people who worked in the engineering groups." Forstall didn't get along with Apple executives either, such as industrial designer Jony Ive, Senior Vice President of Internet Software and Services Eddy Cue, or Senior Vice President of Mac and Devices Hardware Engineering Bob Mansfield.

Forstall was deeply criticized for the execution of Apple's latest maps app, which is the company's first in-house maps service application on iOS. It was released in September along with iOS 6, and mocked for its geography and navigation issues.

Reports have noted that Apple's time schedule for the maps launch was what led to the problems, insinuating that a quick launch was more important than a finished product.

Now, Apple is showing Forstall the door, and no one seems to be too upset about it. Rather, many Apple employees have welcomed the promotions given to Ive, Cue, Mansfield and Craig Federighi, Apple's senior vice president of Mac Software Engineering.

Ive will take over Human Interface (HI) for the company while Cue will take on Siri, Maps, the iTunes Store, the App Store, iCloud and the iBookstore. Furthermore, Mansfield will lead a new group called "Technologies" for all of Apple's wireless teams while Federighi will take over iOS and OS X.

In addition to Forstall, Apple fired its retail head John Browett as well. Browett, which only joined Apple in April of this year, was responsible for a faulty hiring formula that led to the reduction of part-time hours and several lay offs of retail employees. Some had only just finished their training.

Samsung Group's 2011 revenue would be $247.5 billion. I would say Apple's competitor is the Samsung Electronics (a subsidiary of Samsung Group) which had a 2011 revenue of $148.944 billion. Samsung Electronics still has a ton more products out there than Apple though, like TV's and cameras and shit. Also, Apple in 2011 made $108.6 billion. I didn't see 2012 Samsung numbers.

Any post that points out the actual scale of Apple's current business and the likely growth trajectory looking forward always pushes the buttons of those who still haven't gotten their heads around quite how big Apple has become and how quickly they are still continuing to grow.

For some the notion that Apple has become a vast business and is still growing literally does not compute, I think it hurts some people's heads.

"We are going to continue to work with them to make sure they understand the reality of the Internet. A lot of these people don't have Ph.Ds, and they don't have a degree in computer science." -- RIM co-CEO Michael Lazaridis